It wasn’t really a dance hall. It was the gym at Bellows Falls Middle School. Looking at it from a parent’s or administrators point of view, the middle school dance seems even more awkward than it felt when I was in 7th grade. I can’t shake this notion of it being a primitive rite as a precursor to selecting breeding pairs. What is the point of gathering up a bunch of pre-teen boys and girls under a mirror ball in a darkened gymnasium to the beat of suggestive disco music? Don’t misunderstand. I appreciate the effort. I really enjoyed the experience. Maybe it is reflective of the changes in the legal face of our society. The whole thing screams liability to me now.
I find myself about to say “I was at the perfect age” again. I think I’ve done that more than a few times only to immediately consider that perhaps everybody feels that way about their youth. I guess Anne Frank might be an exception here. Did she ever get to hold a sweaty, nervous hand in the emboldening darkness of the school dance? To steal an awkward yet exhilierating kiss near the end of that slow song? I guess I’ll have to read her diary.
I am going to go out on limb and suggest that I was, in fact, at the perfect age for the disco era. Had I been younger, I would have missed it. Had I been older, I might have been more interested in the scene than the music. As it was, I was in that 12 to 14 range where I could safely get a taste of what was beyond the dance floor under the guided supervision of certified chaperones.
Back in the late 1970’s we were still a few years away from Tipper Gore and the PMRC. Back then, music didn’t come with warning labels. Record companies seemed to take that extra step to keep things more suggestive than explicit. Doesn’t that seem to serve as another example of how allowing government intervention backfires and just makes things more extreme? Really, after all the PMRC stuff, music seems to be more explicit than ever. Would it have gone that way anyway? No way to know but I’m sure that there is a certain demographic that seeks out that little warning label. Maybe we should pick the PMRC up again later.
Are all middle school dances the same? A darkened gym with a mirror ball casting a swirl of “stars”. A few auxillory lights splashing the floor with three colors. Banners hand painted by some student committee. The girl who allegedly smokes pot with the older sisters, making out with a tough looking guy at the top of the bleachers. Girls swarming in flocks to and from the bathroom. Guys in small packs of 3 or 4 roaming the perimeter. The Wallflower girls swaying just inches away from that wall of speakers. That one guy who wore a suit. Not the cool John Travolta Saturday Night Fever suit. Just a Sunday go to meeting suit who thinks he looks like the John Travolta suit. He is out there in the middle of the floor dancing by himself doing all the Travolta moves while a faint circle surrounds him. No that wasn’t me but I could get away with dancing. I had a reputation for sillines and being kinetically unpredictable so the risk of looking unusual on the dance floor was low.
I know that Disco music would soon fall out of favor in a big way with the general public but I liked it then and I still do. It is sad that since my first post in the BFMS, 2 of the artists mentioned then have since died. Robin Gibb and Donna Summer were a big part of my Middle School Dance Hall Days.
The Bee Gees – Stayin’ Alive
Donna Summer – Dim All The Lights
Olivia Newton-John – Magic
Meco – Star Wars / Cantina Band
Here we combine Disco music with one of my other favorite things at that time, Star Wars.
Yvonne Elliman – If I Can’t Have You
Doesn’t this song speak directly to every 7th grader? Didn’t we all feel that there was always somebody just out of reach?
The Bee Gees – More Than A Woman
David Shire – Night On Disco Mountain
Again, I’ve come to end of a post feeling like I should be on an infomercial. All these songs really take me back to a simpler time.